History...
History repeats itself, only not really. We don’t live in a cycle. We do keep making the same mistakes, though.
Thoughtful people like to think about what they would have done if they had lived in Germany in 1930, 1931, 1932. With the luxury of hindsight, they like to think they would have been better than those people then.
The reality is that they would do back then the exact same thing they are doing now. Go about their lives, ignorant… blissfully so.
Some would be suppressing concerns, troubling thoughts, and suspicions. They would be saying, “I will do something about my worries if the need ever arises.” Yet like the frog in the pot of slowly boiling water, they would be telling themselves, “It isn’t bad enough yet.”
Others would be embracing stoked fears and fictions. They would be saying that our responses to those fears may look bad, but they are necessary and needed, and we won’t take things too far.
You don’t live in 1930s Germany. This is not that moment. Clearly. This is a different time and place. What ignorant bliss are you embracing? What concerns are you suppressing? About what are you telling yourself, “It isn’t bad enough to think about yet”? What fears are you allowing to dominate you? What evil are you tolerating because, “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”?
Don’t surrender to the idols of fear or comfort. You are better than that, aren’t you?
Thoughtful people like to think about what they would have done if they had lived in Germany in 1930, 1931, 1932. With the luxury of hindsight, they like to think they would have been better than those people then.
The reality is that they would do back then the exact same thing they are doing now. Go about their lives, ignorant… blissfully so.
Some would be suppressing concerns, troubling thoughts, and suspicions. They would be saying, “I will do something about my worries if the need ever arises.” Yet like the frog in the pot of slowly boiling water, they would be telling themselves, “It isn’t bad enough yet.”
Others would be embracing stoked fears and fictions. They would be saying that our responses to those fears may look bad, but they are necessary and needed, and we won’t take things too far.
You don’t live in 1930s Germany. This is not that moment. Clearly. This is a different time and place. What ignorant bliss are you embracing? What concerns are you suppressing? About what are you telling yourself, “It isn’t bad enough to think about yet”? What fears are you allowing to dominate you? What evil are you tolerating because, “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”?
Don’t surrender to the idols of fear or comfort. You are better than that, aren’t you?
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